Language and etymology

Language and Etymology

communication, words, and word origins and evolution

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Language quirks and facts[edit | edit source]

the English language has more unique words than any other language
- Arabic has more words through compound word use, but those compounds are made up of individual words as opposed to word parts

Russian uses a distinct word for the positive and negative connotations of "because of" or "thanks to"
- благодаря = positive connotation
  - as in "Thanks to hard studying, I aced the test"
- из за = negative connotation
  - "I lost points on my paper because of having forgotten about the due date"

excellent demonstration of how language morphs across space and time
in Old English, "curry" means "to cook"
- after British colonization of India, the word became synonymous with the common Indian cooking spice, called today, "curry"
"Curry a favor" has no relation to the spice
- "curry" came from the Old French "torcher" for "groom" as in to wipe down and clean a horse
origin of "curry a favor":
- from the 14th century French satirical poem,Roman de Fauvel ("roman" = romance story or verse)
in the story:
- Fauvel was a horse or ass
- the goddess Fortuna answers Fauvel's request to move into the palace and become a lord
  - priests and other lords visit Fauvel and "curry" (groom) him in order to gain his favor
- "fauvel" refers to the brownish color of fallow (un-planted) field, and was a color symbolic of vanity
  - fauvel may also have been a play on the words, "false veil"
- the expression "curry fauvel" was picked up by English speakers
  - but as memory of the story of Fauvel faded, the use of the word morphed into the more recognizable "favor"
  - thus, "curry favor" means to hypocritically flatter a vain person for some favor or advantage
see
- https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/curry%20favor
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_de_Fauvel